Mineral Resources

Mineral Resources

Ukraine is very rich in mineral resources. It contains iron and manganese ores, natural gas, salt, sulphur, graphite, flux limestone. Ukraine also has deposits of oil, bauxite as well as black coal. Mineral resources can be classified into three main groups: fuels, metals and nonmetals. Fuels include deposits of black and brown coal, natural gas and peat. The reserves of black coal are concentrated in two basins: the Donets and Lviv-Volynian Basins, deposits of brown coal are to be found in many places on the Right Bank. They form the large Dnieper Brown Coal Basin. The western regions of Ukraine contain small deposits of brown coal. Brown coal is used as local fuel for power stations, factories and plants, also in household heating.

Three oil and natural gas regions have been discovered in Ukraine: the Subcarpathian, Dnieper-Donets and Black Sea regions. The most promising deposit of oil in Western Ukraine is the Dolyna field. In the Dnieper-Donets Region the largest gas fields are Kharkiv region. Gas deposits have been also discovered in Sumy, Poltava and Dnipropetrovsk regions. The Black Sea region encompasses the southern part of Zaporizhia and Kherson regions as well as the northern part of the Crimea.
Peat has been used in Ukraine for a long time. Its extraction has been greatly increased and it is important local fuel in industry: it is also widely used as an organic fertilizer. The greatest deposits of peat are in Polissia, but it is also to be found in marshy river valleys.

Ukraine is rich in deposits of iron, manganese, mercury, titanium and other ores. The deposits of iron ore are one of the largest in the world. They are concentrated in Kryvy Rih, Kerch, Kremen-chuk and Bilozerka.

Ukraine is one of the richest places in the world for reserves of manganese ore which is used in the manufacture of high-quality steel. Several deposits are located within Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions.

Titanium is important in the space, chemical, atomic and other areas. It has been discovered in Dnipropetrovsk region. Mercury is obtained from cinnabar, the largest deposit being the Mykytivsky field in Donetsk region. Ukraine has inexhaustible reserves of raw material for the production of the magnesium, which is obtained from the rich brine of Syvash Bay. Ukraine has also deposits of bauxite, nickel, cadmium, bismuth, arsenic and antimony.

Ukraine's depths are rich in non-metallic minerals, which are widely used in the national economy. The important ones among them are rock and potassium salts, sulphur, fire clay and building materials. The largest deposits of rock salt are centered in the Donbas and in Solotvyno in Transcarpathia, Subcarpathia has deposits of potassium salts (Kaiush) and the largest deposit of native sulphur (Rozdolske). The main deposit of fire clay is in the Donbas (Chasovoyarsk). Large reserves of red and grey granite, chalk, marl are also found in Ukraine.
There are many curative mineral waters in Ukraine.